


Being Better Than Them

by forgetcanon



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Gen, Sole Survivor (Mass Effect)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-14
Updated: 2014-04-14
Packaged: 2018-01-19 08:40:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1462909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forgetcanon/pseuds/forgetcanon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You don't get to lie!" The man screamed, "You don't get to-" He swung around, checking that the three of them were staying back, and his voice dropped in shock. "Shepard?"</p><p>"Toombs?" Shepard asked. "I... I watched you die on Akuze." And yet, here he was. The only survivor, confronted with another.</p><p>Tali'Zorah watches Shepard face a demon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Being Better Than Them

Shepard never took off his helmet on an op. Not when scouting, not when taking out mercenaries or husks, not even when standing in the middle of their corpses after the area had been cleared. He just didn't. When she'd asked if that was normal, perhaps a ranking officer thing, Ashley had shaken her head.

"Akuze," Ashkey had said, and explained how, after camping on a planet side on a scouting mission, Thresher Maws had slaughtered Shepard's unit, to the man.

Now, Shepard's hands scrabbled at the seals on his helmet, yanking it off with little regard for the external oxygen cord, and even less for the screaming mercenary still holding a gun. Shepard's deep brown skin was ashen, his hair stuck up in sweat-soaked clumps, but what scared Tali was the look in his eyes.

"You don't get to lie!" The man screamed, "You don't get to-" He swung around, checking that the three of them were staying back, and his voice dropped in shock. " _Shepard_?"

"Toombs?" Shepard asked. "I... I watched you _die_ on Akuze." And yet, here he was. The only survivor, confronted with another.

Toombs shook his head and turned to snarl at the scientist on the end of his gun. "They _took_ me, Shepard. The scientists."

"Th-this man is delusional!" the scientist bleated. Then, "You can't prove any of this!" (That seemed to do the trick for Shepard. His finger went from resting on the trigger guard of his pistol to hovering just over the trigger. Tali knew who he'd shoot, if his arm came up.)

The story came out. The scientists, curious about Thresher Maws but unwilling to use data collected by the species who had already studied them, arranged for a little data collection of their own. Shepard charged the tank, used it to wound the Maw enough that it would retreat, radioed for help, and passed out. The Cerberus team rushed in to examine the bodies while they could. One of the bodies still breathed.

Shepard was crackling, now, eyes sharp and as quick as he was during a firefight. "What did they **do** to you?"

From what the sound of what they'd done to him, maybe the acid and the Maw's teeth would have been a more merciful end.

"This man deserves to die, Shepard! For you, for me, for everyone in the unit! Are you with me?"

Tali braced for the shot, looking away so later she could claim she hadn't seen it without lying. He did deserve it. They'd killed people for less.

Shepard breathed, slowly. "No. No, Toombs. You're better than this. You're not like them."

Toombs whirled on him, teeth flashing. " _Don't tell me who I am_! You got away with a few scratches and a scary reputation!" Shepard flinched. "The rest of the unit died! I was tortured for years, Shepard! You can't judge what I'm like!"

"No, I can't." Shepard agreed. His voice started to climb as he spoke. "But Corporal Riley's daughter can judge _them_. Private Reynold's boyfriend, the one he never shut up about, can judge them. The whole damn galaxy can judge them, but _that can't happen if he dies here_."

Toombs readjusted his grip on his pistol, his eyes burning. Shepard must have seen something flicker, because he said, softly, "Going to trial hurts them more."

"...Okay," Toombs said, lowering his pistol slowly. "Okay. I. Okay."

"Okay," Shepard agreed. He stepped forward and gently took the gun from him. "Williams, radio the Normandy, tell them we need an Alliance cruiser to pick up a prisoner. Then, guard the prisoner."

The scientist let Ashley corral him in a corner of the room. She wasn't gentle about finding some cord to tie him up with, either. Not fitting into the chain of command and the procedure that came with arresting someone, Tali half-heartedly followed her.

Shepard took Toombs by the arm and led him away. The door shut behind them.

Ashley tapped her radio. "Shepard, Normandy's inbound to help start cleanup. Alliance Cruiser ETA is two hours."

" _Thank you, Ashley_ ," Shepard said, and went off comms.

Tali jerked her head in the direction that Shepard had headed. "Should we...?"

Ashley shook her head. "Nah. The Commander has some demons to exorcise."

It was a long two hours. When the cruiser arrived, Shepard lead the scientist out. He wasn't rough, Tali noticed. She'd seen the Commander be rough. But the shove he gave the scientist near the door wasn't gentle, either.

\--

Shepard came down to engineering at least once a day, depending on his schedule. Normally he was chipper, bringing coffee for Adams and the engineers while he asked for a status report, but today he was quiet and asked only for the report. When he turned toward the bright drive core, Tali noticed the shadows under his eyes were not the product of bad lighting, but of bad sleep.

She approached him during lunch. "Can I sit?" she asked, pulling out the chair opposite him.

Shepard flicked his fingers. "You don't need to ask, Tali."

She sat. "Today, I think I do."

Shepard looked up from where he'd been methodically cutting up his meal. "Tali?"

"Are you okay? I mean, with what happened yesterday?"

She didn't know if she was allowed to ask that question. Shepard was a human, a Spectre, a captain, and far older and wiser than she knew. Tali knew that Williams had asked him the same thing, and probably Liara and Garrus, too. Ship scuttlebutt wouldn't suffice for this. She needed to hear it herself.

Shepard's eyes flickered over her mask, his face going calm and smooth in the way it always did when he was deciding how to react. "No," he finally said. "I'm not. But I'll get there."

Tali nodded, standing to go. (She didn't eat in the mess hall. The humans always stared or made a point of not staring.)

"Toombs said they couldn't make him into a killer," Shepard said suddenly. "That, no matter what they did, at least he wasn't that."

Tali shook her head. "You're not a killer, Shepard."

Shepard opened his mouth like he was going to debate the topic.

"The scientist is alive," Tali pressed. "I thought you were going to shoot him. If you hadn't, you could have let Toombs do it. He would have deserved to die, any way. But you didn't."

"That's not because I'm a good person," Shepard said. "All I could think was, 'would a Spectre kill an unarmed prisoner?'"

"Apparently Cerberus would torture one, so I'd say you're ahead of them by a lot."

A laugh fought its way from Shepard's lips. "That's true. Thanks, Tali."

"For what?"

"For being honest, and making me laugh." He shrugged, beginning to eat. "I'm not fine, but that sure helps."

The next time they returned to the Citadel, he bought her a quarian tea set. She didn't drink tea, but Tali thought it would look good in whatever berthing she would get back on the Flotilla. She carefully avoided thinking about why that made her sad.

**Author's Note:**

> I imagine a quarian tea set would be something like this: tea leaves go in one slot, water in another. It purifies the water and the leaves, combines and heats them, and produces a sealed container of tea. The whole thing would probably be smaller than an assault rifle.
> 
> Cathair Shepard drinks tea. He doesn't see why anyone wouldn't.


End file.
